


ups and downs

by starksnack



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Declarations Of Love, Fear, M/M, Panic Attacks, Protective Steve Rogers, Trapped In Elevator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-14 16:08:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29298648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starksnack/pseuds/starksnack
Summary: Tony and Steve get trapped in the freight elevator, panic attacks and declarations of love ensue.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 11
Kudos: 45
Collections: POTS (18+) Stony Stocking 2020





	ups and downs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fuzzyhamish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzyhamish/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [fuzzyhamish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzyhamish/pseuds/fuzzyhamish) in the [stony_stocking_2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/stony_stocking_2020) collection. 



> for fuzzyhamish who wanted Tony being scared/alone in a dark place and Steve keeping him warm/ safe.

Thanks to the Hulk, Avengers tower was undergoing repairs.  _ Again _ . This time he’d taken out the entire elevator after Clint had thought it would be fun to start a food fight at their team dinner last week. Tony made a mental note to invent a spoon that couldn’t also act as a catapult. Even he had winced when Clint had nailed a pea right up Bruce’s nose.

Not that Tony would ever say anything to Bruce. He loved his best friend and he didn’t want him to ever feel guilty about the other guy.

Tony was just getting into the freight elevator after a long work bender, sighing as he tried to massage out the crick in his neck. He hated the freight elevator, it was old and tired and Tony should have taken it out after the tower’s construction concluded.

Then again, if he had done that, he’d be walking up more than ninety flights of stairs right now. That wasn’t the best trek to be making while sleep deprived and half-delirious.

Tony couldn’t wait to be in his bed, luxuriating in his sheets and finally getting some sleep. He only had time for a two-hour power nap, but Tony was looking forward to a warm shower and jerking off before finally resting after two days in the workshop rewriting the laws of physics.

His stomach growled and he rubbed his empty belly. Maybe coffee on the communal floor was in order first. After a brief weighing of pros and cons, Tony jabbed the button for the common room floor and waited as the elevator rose higher. He missed the view from the other elevator. The way he could see New York stretched out for miles around him as he ascended to the top of his tower, a beacon of the future.

Instead, the freight elevator had two yellowing bulbs lighting it up in sickly jaundiced hues. The stainless steel walls weren’t exactly aesthetically pleasing either. Tony wrinkled his nose. The moment the other elevator was repaired, he was sprucing this one up. Better lighting, maybe a mirror. Tony thought his reflection made everything better.

The elevator dinged, doors opening to the gym floor as Steve stepped inside with a bashful half-wave. He must have just finished his morning workout, sweat clinging to his hair as he dried his face with the towel slung around his shoulders.

A joke about telling Steve to get his own elevator instead of stinking up this one died on Tony’s lips as Steve brushed his hair out of his face, biceps flexing deliciously and beaded with sweat. Tony blamed lack of sleep for the way he thought of licking the sweat off every inch of Steve’s skin, lips dipping lower and lower-

“Heya Tony.”

Steve’s voice was like a warm hug drawing him out of his filthy thoughts. Thankfully blushing had been conditioned out of Tony and he felt himself relaxing against the uncomfortable wall of the elevator in feigned nonchalance. He had just enough in him to give Steve one of his trademark lazy smirks.

“I was just about to bring you food,” Steve admitted.

Those words were usually the way to Tony’s heart, but he was so exhausted that even the thought of opening and closing his mouth to chew made him feel sleepy. Of course, Captain Mother Hen wouldn’t really understand that.

Tony tried anyway. “I’m heading up to bed actually.”

Steve was already shaking his head. “I can hear your stomach grumbling from over here.” Tony frowned. That was no fair considering Steve had enhanced hearing. Tony put a hand protectively over his tummy and Steve sighed with a teasing eye roll. “At least let me make you some blueberry pancakes before you head to bed.”

Tony perked up at that thought, his mouth already watering at the idea of his favorite breakfast. And getting to watch Steve make them would be even better, what with the unobstructed view of his muscular back and perfect ass. Tony would sit through breakfast just for the mouthwatering pinup Steve made of every situation.

“I could be convinced,” he mumbled, the hint of a smile tugging at his lips.

And then, because the universe hated him, the elevator screeched to a halt.

“Jarvis?” Tony called, his heart jumping in his throat as the elevator shifted weirdly with an ominous creak. “Buddy, what’s wrong?”

‘There was an electrical failure during repairs to the other elevator,“ Jarvis cut in, a weird urgency to his tone. “I’m afraid this area of the tower is about to lose power. The backup generators should kick in _ — _ ” The abrupt cut-off had Tony’s heart lurching in his chest. He couldn’t lose Jarvis, not again.

The silence echoed loudly in Tony’s ears as he gripped the elevator’s stability bar. He didn’t realise his breath was coming out in heavy pants until Steve was helping him sit down.

“Hey, Tony I’m here,” Steve whispered gently. Grabbing Tony’s fingers, Steve spread them across his own chest over his beating heart. “You’re not going through this alone. We’re together, just like I promised you.”

“Together,” Tony breathed, trying to get some semblance of his composure back so he wasn’t losing it in front of the most attractive man on planet earth. Tony’s anxiety was never going to let him forget this one. “Right _ — _ just like you said old man _ — _ How could I forget?”

Steve smiled reassuringly. “I sure did. And you know me, I always keep my promises.”

Above them, the lights flickered out with a buzz and Tony really thought his heart was going to stop, his lungs seizing as he struggled to take in a calm breath. He always knew the darkness would be what choked him.

Without his vision, his imagination ran rampant. He was underwater being crushed by his own home as he suffocated in the cold Pacific Ocean. He was cold and alone and asphyxiating on hydrogen and helium as he looked out into the vast expanse of space. He was back in the musty Afghanistan desert getting dunked repeatedly in murky water as he clung to the last dregs of breath fast escaping his lungs.

“Tony, Shellhead, stay with me.” Steve was suddenly tearing at his shirt, ripping it open so the arc reactor was exposed, casting blue light over both of their faces. “Look, you’re not in the dark, I’m right here.”

Tony gripped Steve’s hand, which was still pressed against the glass of the arc reactor. This reactor wasn’t embedded in his chest, but it still lent Tony the strength he needed to feel protected and finally relax just a touch. He looked up at Steve. His eyes were even bluer in the light of the reactor and Tony’s lips parted as he focused on the fast kicking of Steve’s heartbeat under his palm. Tony’s own heartbeat slowed as he felt himself finally coming down out of his panic.

“Steve,” he whispered, gasping like he’d been drowning in the depths of his own trauma. “You owe me a new shirt.”

Steve’s warm smile was all it took to have Tony breathing easier.

“You’re welcome to take any of the ones from my closet, but I know you secretly think they’re mini time machines back to the forties,” Steve teased.

Tony wrinkled his nose at the thought of Steve’s stiff clothes. On anyone else, they would have been dumb, but Steve just looked so unbelievably sexy in whatever he put on. There was no way that Tony would let Steve know though. “They’re hideous and you know it. The forties called, they want their clothes back.”

Steve snorted at Tony’s antics, and he finally started to stand, bringing Tony up with him. 

Then the elevator lurched and Tony was throwing himself back into Steve’s arms because as large as Tony’s ego was, Steve was still serum enhanced and without the suit, Tony was a squishy human. He wasn’t ready to go yet, the bots would be upset and he was too pretty to die! What if they fell ninety stories in the elevator shaft and he never got to tell Steve, “I love you!”

Steve’s breath hitched in his throat, and he reached up to cup Tony’s cheek. Despite the fact that Tony had just yelled in his face, Steve was calm and collected in a way that truly demonstrated the command he had over his emotions in dangerous situations. If Tony had someone issuing declarations of love, even without the stress of imminent death, he would probably be freaking out. He was freaking out right now.

“Take a breath for me. We’re going to be okay. Jarvis will make sure the generators come back on for this section of the building. There is no way we’re going to fall. One of the armors would come to help out before that happened,” Steve reassured him, rubbing Tony’s back.

But the platitudes didn’t even matter. Tony didn’t need Steve to be Captain America, he needed him to be Steve and tell him that he was scared and he loved Tony too. Humiliation spread across Tony’s cheeks in an uncomfortable heat as he realized Steve probably wasn’t issuing his own declaration because didn’t feel the same way. Tony tried to pull away, tail between his legs and eyes lowered in humiliation, but Steve had a tight grip on his arms, not letting him get away.

“Sorry that was awkward,” Tony laughed, gathering together the last of his composure before he really broke down over something as dumb as a power failure. Well, actually over Steve’s rejection, but he would never admit that to himself, let alone Steve.

Tony pasted on his best press smile, the one that really smoothed things over when he owed Pepper a few pairs of shoes. “Fear of death and all that, I didn’t mean-”

“Before you say that and take it all back,” Steve interrupted, a pained look crossing his face that looked eerie in the pale light of the arc reactor, “I love you too.”

Tony’s jaw dropped and as if by magic, the lights blinked back on in the elevator. There was a soft whirring before the lights started flashing.

Silence stretched between them in a pregnent pause where Tony only gaped at Steve. “You love me?”

The disbelief was evident in his voice, but he only had to see the sincerity in Steve’s beautifully honest eyes to know it was true before he even confirmed it. 

“I do,” Steve replied as he slid an arm around Tony’s shoulders, helping him stand and pressing a kiss to his cheek. When Tony looked at him, Steve had the most adorable blush spread across his freckled cheeks as he looked at Tony from under his eyelashes. “Why do you think I bring you food and give your bots pictures of you and spend so much time making sure you’re healthy?”

“Because you’re wholesome and you get off on doing the right thing?”

Steve laughed deeply in a way that had happiness curling Tony’s toes. He felt ridiculous. They hadn’t even kissed and Tony was already feeling inklings of euphoria dripping into his soul. Tony smiled up at Steve, a real one this time.

“Well, I do like doing the right thing,” Steve replied, tipping his head against Tony as Jarvis resumed the elevator function. “But I’ve also been in love with you.”

Steve blushed. “You know the first time I ever smiled in the twenty-first century was when you were talking about shawarma. You’re so bright and full of life Tony. You don’t have to be afraid of the dark Tony, you’re your own personal sun.”

The words warmed Tony up from the inside out and suddenly he felt grounded despite being a hundred feet up. Wrapping his arms around Steve, Tony finally pulled him down for a sweet kiss. Steve tasted a little like sweat and orange juice but Tony couldn’t ask for anything better. 

Maybe Tony owed Bruce a muffin basket.


End file.
